Johnson Stood Up for Those He Hired and Nurtured

In a blog post announcing his plans to leave VMware
to pursue other interests, Johnson said, Spring was created to simplify
enterprise Java development, and has succeeded in that goal. The Spring
community continues to grow, Spring is more widely adopted than ever and Spring
has become the dominant programming model for enterprise Java.
Tod Nielsen, co-president of
Application Platform at VMware, told eWEEK that SpringSource was central
to VMwares strategy for connecting with developers. He said the company had
watched as SpringSource became a seat of power in the Java community as the
number of developers using Spring reached into the millions. We knew we wanted
them on our team, Nielsen said. Nielsen, who helped launch and then manage the
Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN), knows a little something about connecting
with developers.

Just as James Goslings and Anders
Hejlsbergs efforts cemented the object-oriented and VM-based platforms that
define enterprise app dev today, Rods efforts defined the next transformation,
and his departure marks the end of an era, said Mik Kersten, CEO of Tasktop
Technologies, founder of the Mylyn open-source project and a close friend of
Johnson. Dependency injection, aspects, open-source frameworks and vendor
independence have won. The simplification of the programming model that Rod
drove will be permanent, and his efforts as both technologist and entrepreneur
have made the lives of Java developers much easier. That's quite a dent to have
made on the way that software is built, both in terms of what Spring delivered,
and in the way it continues to influence other platforms. Lets hope that Rod
doesnt consider himself to be done just yet, as I know that hes got more of
this drive left in him.

I first ran into Rod at a TheServerSide
Java Symposium (TSSJS) in Las Vegas. I sat in on his talk and
watched and waited while a throng of developers hit him up afterward to share
their coding problems and ask him for advice. I introduced myself and asked for
an interview. At first, a reluctant Johnson waved me away but eventually he
relented. I knew there was an emerging story there. And if you ask him, Rod
will acknowledge that I was the first journalist to hit him up. That wouldnt
last long, however.

Darryl K. Taft covers the development tools and developer-related issues beat from his office in Baltimore. He has more than 10 years of experience in the business and is always looking for the next scoop. Taft is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and was named 'one of the most active middleware reporters in the world' by The Middleware Co. He also has his own card in the 'Who's Who in Enterprise Java' deck.